The Dodge Ram is a big truck that can carry heavy loads and is great for work or family use. It's popular because it's strong and has a nice inside, making it comfortable to drive.
The Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo X is a version of the Grand Cherokee SUV that offers a mix of ruggedness and luxury. The 2025 model has new features that make it more comfortable and easier to drive.
The Alpine A110 is a small sports car that is fun to drive and looks great. It's known for being light and quick, which makes it exciting for people who enjoy driving.
A combustion engine is a type of engine that makes power by burning fuel, like gas. It's the kind of engine most cars have used for a long time before electric cars became popular.
A hot hatch is a small car that is designed to be fast and fun to drive. It has a hatchback design, which means the back opens up for easy access, and it's made to be sporty and exciting.
The Renault 5 is a small car that was very popular in the past and has now been updated as an electric vehicle. It's known for its unique style and is considered an iconic model.
Formula 1 is a type of car racing that features very fast cars and is held on tracks around the world. It's known for its exciting races and advanced technology.
Formula One is a type of car racing that features very fast cars and takes place on special tracks. It's one of the most popular and prestigious racing competitions in the world.
The Goodwood Festival of Speed is a big car event in England where people can see and hear many different types of cars racing up a hill. It's a fun place for car fans to gather and enjoy the excitement.
Alpine is a brand that makes sporty cars. They are working on new technology, like a car that runs on hydrogen instead of gasoline, which is better for the environment.
Goodwood Revival is a famous car racing event where vintage cars race on a historic track. It's a fun celebration of classic cars and motorsport history.
The MG Midget is a small sports car that people love to drive because it's light and fun. It was made a long time ago, and many people enjoy racing them.
Power-to-weight ratio tells you how much power a car has compared to how heavy it is. If a car is light and has a lot of power, it usually goes faster and is more fun to drive.
Car
Alpine A110R
The Alpine A110R is a sporty car that's really light and fast. It's made for people who love to drive and want a fun experience on the road.
Rallying is a type of car racing that takes place on different types of roads, including dirt and gravel. Drivers race against the clock and must be skilled at navigating the course.
Car
Alpine A390
The Alpine A390 is a bigger version of the A110, which means it has more room inside but still aims to be fast and fun to drive.
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Welcome to a bonus episode of the AutoCar Podcast, AutoCar Meets.
This week, our associate editor, James Atwood,
talks to Nicola Burnside, who is the head of Alpine UK.
This podcast is, of course, brought to you by our sponsor Anderson,
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And now, over to James.
So, hi, I'm James, AutoCar's associate editor,
and I'm here with the head of Alpine UK, Nicola Burnside.
Nicola, welcome to the AutoCar Meets podcast.
Thank you very much.
I guess we should probably start with how you view Alpine's
state in the UK at the moment.
It's an interesting time for the brand.
So where do you think the brand is right now?
I'm really pleased to say the brand is in such an exciting
place in the UK.
We've launched the 1890 this year,
and it's really moved the brand from being a single model
focused brand to one that now is starting to launch
a range of products.
And the 1890 has been really successful in the UK.
The UK loves a hot hatch, and that's exactly what we've
brought to market.
Absolutely.
I mean, I guess, as you were saying,
since Alpine was arrived in 2017,
it's largely been this one-car brand.
So how are you managing that transition of trying to grow it,
but also get people to understand it's now
kind of an electric brand?
I think we're playing it very carefully, to be honest.
We really appreciate the success that the A110 has had.
Obviously, it's a combustion engine car.
It's very light, but the A290 takes a lot of that DNA
from the A110 into the new car.
And that means the transition for us has been a lot easier.
The A290 is the lightest in its class, in its segment.
It performs like a combustion car,
and it has elements like the Brembo brakes from the A110.
So we've been able to really link the two products.
And the driving enjoyment you get from the A290
also tells its own story.
And we're finding our customers and owners
are telling that story on our behalf.
So it's been a really positive story and very organic.
I think that's the other element
that I'm really pleased about.
It's not something that we have had to work that hard at,
to be honest.
It's really been adopted by the UK public quickly,
and you can see that in the numbers.
So how is it doing the A290, roughly?
It's been really successful for us.
So in September, we were the fastest growing
premium manufacturer in the UK.
We had over the volume from the brand
has been over 500% up over the last two years.
And that obviously is driven by the A290.
It's also conquesting lots of new customers.
Over 80% of the people coming into Alpine
are new to the brand,
but they are really engaging with our A110 owners.
So we're creating this bigger community
as a result of having the two cars.
Where are you finding customers from?
Where are they coming from?
They are coming from all walks of life.
So we have kept our original core customer base,
which is a mix of motorsport, enthusiasm, petrol heads,
and they are transitioning into EV.
But we've also got a lot of younger customers coming in
that are able to access the brand.
And as you would expect,
a lot of people from city centres
that are focused on EV product
to access those city centre areas.
So it's really broad actually,
which is surprising and really positive for us.
Are you sort of focusing on urban areas
given the kind of the hot hatch brief
of this car with the electric brief or?
That was the original idea,
but if I'm honest, we haven't had to be that specific.
And it's good from my perspective,
because it means we are reaching a really broad audience.
And that's what I would like Alpine to do.
I think the thing that unites all of our customers
is they have a passion for driving
and they have a passion for cars.
And that's what that's Alpine's core DNA.
It's not just motorsport, but it is petrol heads
and it's petrol heads that are embracing EV.
And that can be any...
Those people can actually be based anywhere.
And as you all see, hopefully when you drive the cars today,
tomorrow on the country roads, they come to life.
How well known is the Alpine brand in the UK?
I think auto car readers, I think probably know
and love the A110, but I suppose it's kind of building
that wider awareness with people of...
Because for so far,
it's been a quite niche sports car brand.
Yeah, I mean, when you have a 2-seater coupé,
it's only ever going to appeal to a specific client base.
And actually considering the volume of cars
we've sold over the past seven years that we've had the A110,
our awareness level has been well surpassed,
the volume of cars that we've actually sold,
due in part, I think, to the positive coverage
from people like yourselves about the car.
We still feel we have a lot, we know we have a way to go
and A290 is helping us to achieve that.
And we've seen a spike since A290 launched in the UK.
We're just over 60% awareness today,
but we want to grow that much, much further.
Obviously, I think it has a lot more heritage in France,
where it's sort of comforting.
Does that give you more freedom as a UK operation
to almost do your own thing
and to establish the brand separately?
Or is it a challenge sometimes explained
to your central colleagues perhaps
that you need to kind of build this heritage knowledge?
I think the French like the Brits
and the Brits like the French.
I think we have a bit of a love-hate relationship
between us.
And actually, that works really well
for brands such as Alpine.
So they look to the UK a lot
to lead some of the innovation
in how we do marketing on the product.
And also the successes we're having on A290
with the second market now to France for that car.
So I think we have a really positive relationship
and a really good relationship.
And together, we're looking to drive the brand forwards.
So for me, it's working really well.
And I suppose you say the Brits tend to love a hot hatch
and I guess that's exactly what you've got with the A290.
That is exactly it.
So I mean, when we launched the A290 in the UK
it was received really well
but when customers and press have been driving it
that's when we've seen the feedback.
And it's like I was explaining to you
the expressions of people when they get out the car
and they describe the feeling of driving the car
and they've played with some of the technology
in the car like the overtake button in the region
and they see the Alpine telematics
in the car that improves your driving style.
That's when really the Alpine DNA comes to life
and it is a hot hatch.
It's a great fun car to drive.
I have one as my daily driver
and when I have my kids in the back
they always say to me,
Mummy, Mummy, press the old button, press the old button.
And if they had their way
I think the police would have been after me
by now to be honest.
How do you manage the relationship with clean Alpine
Renault?
Obviously in the past the A110 was such a different thing
for everything Renault was doing.
But I guess with the A290
you can sort of spot the similarity between it
and the Renault 5 or the kind of shared DNA.
Do you have to approach things differently
now that that kind of link is perhaps more obvious?
I think the beauty of the Renault 5 and the A290
is their brilliant products in their own rights
and actually that's benefited.
The Renault 5 is such a fantastic EV city car.
It's an icon that's reimagined
and then to have a hot hatch based off it
like it was in the past
gives us two products that are real strengths.
They have independent personalities.
They have independent I think roles within the market
but they're both brilliant.
And so for me it's a positive sister
and brother relationship.
Absolutely sir.
You've had quite a broad career in this industry.
Perhaps this runs through how you've ended up here at Alpine?
I ask myself that on a daily basis.
I mean I've always been a petrolhead.
I've always been a car person
ever since I was a very young girl.
I was into F1.
I always liked a certain car brand
with a prancing horse on the front.
And I always wanted to get into motorsport.
I always wanted to be a driver.
I always wanted to race cars.
I got my break probably over 15 years ago now
where I moved from alcohol business
which is what I was doing into Volkswagen Group
worked for various different car brands there
and van brands.
I do love a van as well as a car.
That's another little bit about me.
Went to make Mercedes-Benz
and then was approached by Alpine
because of my breadth of experience
both outside of automotive and within
and also my personal sort of passion within motorsport
and the fact that I do a lot of racing on the side
and I think they thought that combined
would give me a different perspective
on how to drive Alpine forwards.
And certainly when I joined the brand two years ago
I did spot an opportunity
to really do things a bit differently,
embrace that motorsport.
The love of motorsport in the UK even more.
Get all of the circuits involved in Alpine
get involved in Goodwood.
And that really did catalyst the brand
and support us to have a really successful entry for 290.
Absolutely, so you said you grew up
with a fan of a particular sort of red car
with the Prancing Horse in the front of it.
So have you managed to now cheer on the blue team
when it comes to Formula One?
Of course, of course.
You've got to cheer on your own team.
I mean, I still love the Prancing Horse brand
but equally I think that Alpine is a French,
it's the French equivalent.
You know, we're not aiming to be anything like Ferrari
but we are in motorsport.
We have a lot of passion behind the brand.
We have a lot of legacy behind the brand
and that's what I love.
And so yes, any motorsport events, F1,
the endurance racing I'm particularly passionate about
I will always support the blues.
Is that something, I mean,
are you kind of looking to really leverage that
in terms of sort of growing awareness about Pino?
Is it a kind of case of you just using it
to build the sort of performance knowledge of the cars?
It's two.
There's absolutely two.
There's two benefits of being in motorsport.
So one is absolutely as a marketing and awareness tool
and F1 is probably the best example of that.
But we also use the innovation and technology
from the motorsport arm and we have Viri
which used to do the engines obviously for F1.
It's now dedicated to Alpine engineering
and technical innovation.
And we do put that now into the road cars
and we also use that to then think about
the future opportunities for the brand.
And there's technology that we're always developing
like the hydrogen combustion prototype Alpine glow
which we had at Goodwood Festival of Speed this year
and even Damon Hill stopped me at the top of the hill
to ask what that was.
I mean, you obviously mentioned a bit
that you've done a bit of racing.
Quite a serious level.
I think you've raced around Goodwood Turkey.
I've raced around Goodwood.
Revival, not this year,
but last year in the forward order trophy in the wet.
The theme seems to be racing in the wet
over the past to the 12, 18 months, I'll be honest.
Every single big race seems to be in the wet.
I loved Goodwood.
Goodwood Revival is such a mega event
and it's so special to be able to race
around that iconic track.
I was also privileged enough to be able to participate
in the more classic this year, also very wet.
So, and at night, which was a new experience.
So four in the morning you wake up,
it's absolutely downpour
and then you're doing the more sound straight
with very low visibility.
Absolutely terrifying, but brilliant.
I suppose that's what I was going to ask is,
what is the appeal?
The adrenaline rush you get from it
might not necessarily be just at the time,
you do get a buzz afterwards.
And to be able to say you've done some of those events
is really special to be part of such historic motoring
that's still continuing to this day.
For me, that gives me a buzz
and it gives me a buzz long after the event itself.
So I'm always looking for the next big thing.
Have you got a particular favorite car you've raced
or a particular favorite race you've done?
Well, I raced non-alpine.
I would love to race a historic Alpine.
I actually try and get my hands on one.
I race classic MGs at the moment
and I have to say my little MG Midget,
which is a pre-66 car with an Ashley kit on,
is the most hilarious fun to drive.
It has the power to weight ratio of an A110R.
So it weighs 500 kilograms.
So it's got 150 great horsepower
and it is bonkers on the track.
It just makes you laugh.
I guess with the sort of slow growth
of electric motorsport at some point
that does give potential for some out in the future.
So maybe there's more opportunities for you
at that pace.
Yeah, hopefully, hopefully.
And Alpine is always looking to develop in motorsport.
You know, even with the electric cars
and with the re-emergence of rallying,
we've been participating in the FIA Eco rally now
and very successfully.
So you never know, maybe I'll add rallying
as a string to my bow.
And I guess, I mean, how important is it
for a brand like Alpine to have someone
who is clearly so passionate about performance
and motorsport kind of rallying it?
I mean, you're asking me,
so slightly biased opinion,
I would say very important.
I think the brand is one where you,
it is about passion
and it is about the love for the brand,
love for the motorsport.
And if you can talk passionately about it
and also participate and talk,
you know, I love talking to customers,
everyone that buys an Alpine,
I love talking to them, getting their feedback
and love seeing people drive the cars.
I love talking to the investors
and to everyone involved.
And I think that really rubs off.
And if you build a community of passionate customers,
passionate employees, passionate salespeople,
that's how you create a brand such as Alpine
and you also create loyalty for the longer term.
That's something I'm very keen to do.
And so 1890s sort of now quite established.
A390 is coming fairly soon.
So what does that do for Alpine?
A390, again, for us it unlocks another door
into another segment.
So it enables another group of people to access Alpine.
So, you know, the A290 is a two,
the A110 is a two-seater coupé.
The A290 is a hot hatch.
And it's not the biggest car.
It's a small hot hatch.
The A390 is bigger,
but it has the performance of the A110.
So it will enable you to experience
the speed and agility of an A110,
but with five seats.
And that, again, will enable us
to talk to a whole new client base.
I guess the future beyond that,
we know there's more new models coming.
So it must give you some confidence
that you can just continue this growth,
continue building awareness.
Yeah, that's absolutely the plan.
And we want to do that in the right way.
And we want to do that organically, like I said,
and it's about having people,
the right sort of customers
and the right positive momentum behind the brand.
But we're super excited about what the future holds.
And yeah, the dream garage for us
is how we unlock that future.
Perfect, Seth.
Well, thank you very much for your time anyway.
It's been a pleasure.
Thank you.
Thanks very much.
Many thanks for listening.
Steve Cropley and Matt Pryor, that's me,
will be back with the regular My Week in Cars podcast
next and every Wednesday.
And thanks again to our sponsor Anderson,
visit Anderson-EV.com for all of your charging needs.
See you next time.
Hi, this is Joe from Vantah.
In today's digital world,
compliance regulations are changing constantly
and earning customer trust has never mattered more.
Vanta helps companies get compliant fast
and stay secure with the most advanced AI,
automation, and continuous monitoring out there.
So whether you're a startup going for your first SOC2
or ISO 27001,
or a growing enterprise managing vendor wrist,
Vanta makes it quick, easy, and scalable.
And I'm not just saying that because I work here.
Get started at Vanta.com.
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About this episode
Nicola Burnside, head of Alpine UK, shares insights on the brand's exciting evolution and its successful launch of the A290 hot hatch. With a focus on transitioning to electric vehicles while maintaining the essence of driving enjoyment, Burnside discusses the growing customer base and the brand's expanding model range. She highlights the importance of motorsport heritage in shaping Alpine's identity and future direction, as well as her personal passion for racing. The conversation reveals how Alpine is connecting with a broader audience while staying true to its performance roots.
In this week's Autocar Meets podcast, associate editor James Attwood meets the head of Alpine UK, Nicola Burnside.
Burnside discusses the rapid growth and bold future plans of Renault's performance brands, educating UK buyers about Alpine and why even petrolheads can love electric performance cars. They also discuss Burnside's passion for performance cars, and her love of historic motorsport.
